What is HDR on TV and how to enable this feature. Everything about HDR in smartphones: what it is, why, and where it occurs
To enjoy high-definition gaming and get the most out of your Xbox One S and X consoles, you'll need to choose a 4K TV with HDR10 support. The article provides a description and specific TV models.
One of the main capabilities of the modern Xbox One S console is the transmission of images to a TV in 4K resolution with HDR support, which makes it possible to observe images with an extended dynamic range. The picture on the screen reflects as much as possible what a person sees in real life.
The 4K standard has high resolution (3840×2160 pixels), which is many times superior to 1080p Full HD. Manufacturers indicate the presence of technology with abbreviations: “4K Ultra HD”, “4K SUHD”, “UHD TV”, “4K”, “SUHD”, “UHD 4K”.
High Dynamic Range technology support– gives the 4K picture an even more stunning look, making the video more realistic. HDR has two formats: Dolby Vision and HDR 10.
- DolbyVision (12bit) is a more advanced version and guarantees better image reproduction, sometimes called BT2020.
- HDR10 (10bit) is an open source standard that does not require any usage fees, unlike Dolby-Vision.
Xbox One S and X only support HDR 10!
If the console is connected to a TV with Dolby Vision, the picture quality will not improve.
The technical name of the HDR10 standard is: “Premium Ultra HD”, “UHD color”, “HDR Premium”.
To check whether your TV receiver supports 4K and HDR-10 or not, you need to:
- Turn on your Xbox and go to Settings.
- Select “All settings” - “Display and sound” - “Video output” - “Advanced video settings” - “4K TV information”.
Which TVs support HDR10?
Already in 2017, almost all models from global manufacturers, such as Samsung, Sony, LG, Panasonic, support “High Dynamic Range 10”, but it is extremely rare to find models that support both HDR formats.
For simplicity, you can refer to the marking OLED And QLED, these models support HDR10.
TVs with HDR 10 and Dolby-Vision (extended list):
Http://www.rtings.com/tv/reviews/best/by-usage/hdr-gaming http://www.rtings.com/tv/learn/hdr10-vs-dolby-vision http://ultrahd. su/tv/glubina-cveta-10-bit-tablica.html
Among the budget options (up to $1000) we can highlight:
- LG 49UH619V ~ $600 (according to user reports)
- Sony XD80-HDR
- Sony KD-49XD8005 HDR-4K
- LG FLAT OLED 4K 65EF9500
- Vizio P50-C1 (supports both standards)
- Samsung UE 55KU7000U HDR-4K
- Samsung KS7000 SUHD
- Samsung KS7500 SUHD
Among the best TVs for game consoles with 4K and HDR10 in the middle and high price categories the following prevail:
- Samsung MU7000
- Samsung KS8000 SUHD
- Samsung KS8500 SUHD
- Samsung KS9000 SUHD
- Samsung KS9500 SUHD
- Samsung Q7F(QLED-SVA / 20ms / 120Hz)
- LG OLED B6
- LG OLED B7
- LG OLED C7(HDR10 + Dolby Vision / 21ms / 120Hz)
- Panasonic TX-65 DXR 900
- Panasonic DX750
- Panasonic EZ952
- Sony XE8077 and XE8096 LED 4K-UltraHD (HDR)
- Sony XD8305 LED 4K-UHD+HDR
- Sony XE90(VA / HDR10 / 120Hz)
- Sony Z9D or ZD9
What to pay attention to, conclusion.
Be careful when choosing a TV that supports the format you need; manufacturers often indicate the availability of the technology, but do not specify the format. As mentioned above, Microsoft XOne S and X game consoles only support HDR 10 (most TVs from Sony and Samsung), but LG can support both technologies at once.
Be sure to look at the detailed description; budget models are equipped with pseudo 10-bit matrices 8 bit + FRC(Frame-Rate-Control). These are not real 10 bits, but standard 8 + software enhancement.
Pay attention to the HDR SUPER and PRO markings on LG TVs:
- HDR-Super– required HDR10 format. TVs that actually display an extended color range. Oled and QuantumDisplay screens (quantum dots).
- HDR-Pro– these are TVs that are technically ready for playback (processor and codecs), but not always ready due to the display (8 bit or 8bit+FRC).
Mark " HDR 1000" has nothing to do with HDR10. This term refers to a brightness value of 1000 nits.
If the display description indicates HDMI version 1.4, then pass by, this standard only supports 30Hz in 4K. For normal 4K/60Hz requires HDMI-2.0.
Also study the technical characteristics of TV sets and look for the “Input Lags” parameter (video signal delay time) among them. For active games such as shooters, A screen with a latency of more than 30 ms is not recommended(milliseconds). Also study the technical characteristics of the TV and look for the “Input Lags” parameter among them (video signal delay time). For active games such as shooters, a screen with latency greater than 30 ms (milliseconds) is not recommended.
PS In mid-2017, it is quite difficult to find a small (39″-45″) and cheap (under $1000) 4K TV with HDR 10 and a real 10-bit matrix. Suitable models start from 50 inches and cost over a piece.
TV manufacturers are constantly improving picture quality. Therefore, new standards are regularly announced. HDR support on TV: what is it? New TV models are produced with this standard. What are its distinctive features? Does it make sense to buy such a TV? To answer these questions, let's take a closer look at what HDR is. Let's analyze the main differences between this standard in the photo and on the TV screen.
Contrast and the ratio of bright and dark areas are criteria that determine image quality. Color rendition is no less important; in many ways it determines the realism of the picture broadcast on the TV screen. The level of comfort while watching films, TV series, and programs will depend on the listed parameters.
Imagine that one TV has a rich color palette and excellent contrast, and the second has high resolution. Which image do you think you will find more attractive? Of course, the first one. A contrasting model can ensure a natural picture. It doesn’t matter which manufacturers’ equipment is being compared: Samsung, LG, Phillips or Sony.
Screen resolution is an important indicator, but contrast completely eliminates it. Because it is the contrast that determines how realistic the broadcast image will be. Therefore, experts emphasize that natural contrast, coupled with competent color reproduction, is much more important than the presence of support for 4K resolution.
The idea behind HDR technology is to expand the contrast and color palette. Bright areas will appear more natural on an HDR-enabled TV than on a regular device. The image looks deeper and more natural. Deep shades of red, green and blue allow for a significant expansion of color.
The introduction of HDR dynamic range technology contributed to the creation of a new color palette standard - Rec. 2020. Its peculiarity is manifested in shades that ordinary TVs simply cannot reproduce. The most striking example is the signature red color of the famous automobile brand Ferrari. It is possible that before you simply did not pay attention to such minor nuances. However, older TVs are not capable of transmitting such intense shades. In reality, these colors look completely different.
Each user will be able to see millions of new, complex colors that have become the basis of the HDR format. Note that the technology under consideration is based on the use of 10-bit color display.
To fully appreciate the benefits of the HDR standard, you need to have a TV that supports this technology and the corresponding content. In order to provide high dynamic range, HDR technology uses advanced backlighting. Brightness adjustment is carried out in different areas of the screen. This approach allows you to achieve maximum peaks in those areas where it is really necessary. The most striking example is the part of the frame in which the sun is shining. The brightness reserve significantly exceeds this parameter of conventional TVs. HDR TVs are up to 1500 nits, while regular devices are 400 nits.
The improved color palette suggests that innovative technologies will be used at the hardware level. For example, quantum dot lighting. Until recently, TVs with such backlighting literally “invented” the shades, which was not good for viewing. Now directors have the opportunity to choose the optimal color to make the scene as deep as possible.
The implementation of the HDR standard was achieved by combining various complex technologies. Therefore, premium-class 4K devices demonstrate the highest quality images. They have the necessary technical characteristics.
HDR technology has several versions. Let's look at each of them. The most common is HDR10. Its peculiarity is that the channel passes up to 10 bits of content. Color palette – 1 billion shades. The stream contains data regarding changes in brightness and contrast in a particular scene. It is this feature that makes the image natural.
The HLG standard was created by a British-Japanese tandem. The BBC and NHK have managed to create an excellent standard. 10-bit encoding was retained. The changes affected the purpose of the stream. The main idea is transmission. There is no critical channel width for the standard under consideration. 20 MB is enough to ensure high-quality broadcasting without any interference.
The Dolby Vision standard is an extended brightness range that significantly exceeds the capabilities of all existing technologies. The standard was implemented by Dolby. The basic principles of HDR technology have been preserved. The changes are manifested in the expansion of the color channel – 12 bits. The color palette includes 8 billion shades. The data flow is enormous. Therefore, you can appreciate the benefits of this technology in the cinema.
Difference with HDR in photo
HDR modes in TVs and photographs have significant differences. If we talk about photos, the HDR format manifests itself in an acidic palette and unnatural contours. On television, completely different principles are used. Let's look at how HDR works on a TV screen and on a photograph to understand what the difference is.
TV support for the HDR standard means an extended dynamic range and the largest possible color palette. Together, these parameters make the image on the screen natural and realistic. Video signal parameters are not limited to standards such as HDTV, since the shooting process and studio processing capabilities have undergone significant modernization.
In photographs, HDR appears in several frames with different exposures. Based on this, a single frame is created that does not create, but simulates a wide dynamic range.
Based on this, we see that the solution to low brightness can be approached from different angles. HDR technology can be a streamlined process for maintaining natural images. The viewer will be able to see the natural quality of the picture captured on camera. The second approach is a collection of different frames to simulate a specific scene. Therefore, HDR in a photo is a lack of realism.
The HDR video stream looks natural. The viewer does not have the feeling that it was previously processed by a huge number of different filters. Naturalness is the key to success. Therefore, the image looks alive.
How to find out if your TV supports HDR technology
You don't need to make any extra effort for this. All necessary information is presented on the box and in the technical documentation. For example, if the box is marked Ultra HD Premium, then this model supports the HDR standard. If the 4K HDR inscription is present, then such a device will not support all versions of the popular standard today.
How to enable HDR on Samsung TV? No additional actions need to be taken. Just play the content in this format. If the equipment does not support this standard, then an error text will appear on the TV screen.
Let's look at several popular HDR TV models from well-known manufacturers. For example, Sony presented a new TV line - XE93. Absolutely all models in this line support the HDR standard. The screen diagonal starts at 55 inches. New models from Sony support absolutely all versions of HDR. They also have several additional benefits:
- innovative lighting Slim Backlight Drive+ with double blocks of diodes. Provides fine adjustment of the brightness of all areas of the screen;
- the X-tended Dynamic Range Pro function improves picture quality regardless of the content format;
- TRILUMINOS Display technology ensures harmonious transmission of all shades of red, blue and green, and also increases brightness;
- The X1 Extreme processor performs HDR remastering, aimed at eliminating noise and improving picture quality.
All of these innovations can significantly increase image quality. Maximum detail guaranteed. Combining HDR and 4K increases viewing angles. Even if you are in close proximity to the screen, image clarity is still maintained. The combination of innovative technologies ensures comfortable viewing regardless of the distance from the screen to the viewer.
LG also introduced a new line of HDR TVs. It was the introduction of Active HDR technology that became the main feature of the new products from the South Korean brand. Absolutely all models in the line support HDR10 and HLG formats, as well as Dolby Vision. Much depends on the content format. Sometimes it even contains static and dynamic data about the brightness level of the scene. Active HDR technology aims to optimize the video stream in accordance with a specific scene. This allows you to achieve even greater brightness and realism.
What you can watch in HDR
Mostly all well-known studios are actively switching to shooting content using the HDR standard. This process started back in 2015. The popularization of HDR content is in full swing. Viewers will not feel any significant problems with the lack of films and TV series made using this technology.
Old TVs were noticeably inferior to studio formats. Because of this, the color palette and depth of the image were significantly reduced. Over time, the situation changed for the better. Everyone will be able to watch films or TV series in studio format at home.
Online cinemas, led by Netflix and Amazon, were among the first to switch to HDR. Today, absolutely all content providers work with this standard. If you have an HDR TV at home, then you will be able to watch absolutely all new films, TV series, and programs in the highest quality. The catalog of available content is constantly expanding. All new products are released in HDR format.
PlayStaion 4 and Xbox One S game consoles also support HDR. Not all video games are released in this format, but the most large-scale projects will provide the opportunity to completely immerse yourself in the game. Horizon 3 Uncharted 4 has already received the necessary updates aimed at improving graphics.
The Ultra HD Blu-Ray format is another new feature. It also supports HDR by default. Movies released on this type of media can be played on an HDR TV. Owners of such equipment will fully appreciate the extended dynamic range and rich color palette. The highest quality of dark and bright areas of the screen will pleasantly surprise the viewer.
Is it worth buying a TV with HDR capabilities? There is plenty of content in this format. It has long ceased to be a rarity. Therefore, you can confidently buy an HDR TV to enjoy realistic images.
Connecting HDR equipment
You don't need new cords to play HDR content. An HDMI High Speed cable will suffice. New TVs support this interface. Therefore, there should be no connection problems. In situations where equipment is connected using an AV receiver, you must first make sure that the tuner is equipped with an HDMI 2.0 interface. Many manufacturers have carried out large-scale interface updates. Therefore, the HDMI 2.0 connector can no longer be called a rarity. To turn on the TV, simply plug the power cord into the outlet. Then select the signal source. You can play content using special applications, such as Netflix.
About 10-15 years ago, any person coming to a store to buy a TV could not bother too much, since the basis of the assortment was CRT devices and flat plasma panels. Today, looking at the abundance of TV devices, a whole ton of questions arise, because from advertising posters and shop windows, incomprehensible designations UHD, OLED, HDR are thrown at the buyer... We haven’t yet gotten used to the new 4K resolution, but a new 8K is already looming on the horizon.
Moreover, it is not always obvious that the same technology can be called differently, while all of them promise a truly realistic picture when watching films. Let's try to understand all these designations and classify televisions according to the properties that are influenced by the technologies used in them.
Display Manufacturing Technologies
The most well-known technologies used today for the manufacture of TV displays (as well as monitors and smartphone screens) are LED, OLED and QLED. They are based on LED semiconductors. They are environmentally friendly, safe and do not consume much electricity. What's the difference?
Liquid crystal displays are the most common among display devices. As the name implies, they are based on liquid crystals, which are located in numerous types of matrices. But the crystals themselves do not glow, so modern TV panels use LED backlighting consisting of several LEDs.
The main feature of such displays is the lowest pixel degradation. Such TVs can work for decades. Depending on the matrix technology, LCD displays can provide good viewing angles, high brightness and good contrast. And the cost of such devices is noticeably lower than high-tech delights, which we will discuss below.
OLED panels use so-called organic light-emitting diodes to transmit images. To create them, layers of film made from organic polymers are used, hence the name. OLED displays immediately attract attention with higher brightness and color images compared to traditional LCD screens. At the same time, their brightness range is very large, and they are the only ones capable of displaying true black color.
The viewing angles of OLED displays are better than those of LCDs (though the difference is not so critical): you will not see changes in color on the screen no matter what angle you look at it. The power consumption of OLED displays is also slightly lower, and their sizes are thinner, since they do not need additional backlighting. Here are just a few colors (on average, about three years of continuous operation), while the price of OLED TVs is noticeably higher than their LCD counterparts.
The technology for manufacturing QLED screens appeared relatively recently and was developed by Samsung. Despite its similarity with OLED, this technology, when designed for modern TV screens, is rather close to LED panels. Instead of an LED, a miniature crystal acts as a pixel, which is called a “quantum dot”.
When exposed to electric current from the matrix, the crystals begin to glow and emit color. Colors may vary depending on the material from which the crystals are made. The obvious advantages of QLED displays are the expanded color gamut compared to LED panels and the lowest power consumption of all the above technologies. What is no less attractive is that the service life of such screens is higher than that of OLED panels (about 7 years of operating time).
Image enhancement technologies
It’s not just the technology used in television screens that affects the quality of the final image. Software algorithms for image enhancement play an important role here. The most famous of them is high dynamic range technology or HDR, which is designed to make the image more detailed, thanks to the accurate depiction of all shades and smooth transitions between them. But few people paid attention to the fact that this option is designated by as many as three standards. What they mean is explained below.
HDR10
The HDR10 standard, which all devices bearing the Premium UHD logo support, is more than just HDR. The number 10 at the end indicates a color depth of 10 bits, which is characterized by better rendering of color tones. Even in night scenes, you will not see a black picture, but will begin to discern details. This technology is successfully used even in video games, enhancing the impression of what is happening on the screen.
Dolby Vision provides the best HDR effect available today. It supports 12-bit color depth, and TVs require a separate hardware chip to play 12-bit video. As a result, TV devices that support HDR Dolby Vision will cost more, but will provide better display of tones and gradients.
Playing Dolby Vision videos on TVs that support HDR10 doesn't make much sense: if the TV has a 4K resolution, the image on it will look like you're watching extrapolated (stretched to a higher resolution) Full HD.
The standard introduced by Samsung could pose serious challenges to the previous two image enhancement algorithms. allows you to dynamically describe the contrast and colors of the image for each individual scene in real time, and not statically, as is the case with Dolby Vision and HDR10.
That is, this standard can significantly improve the dynamic range of color shades even in streaming broadcasts. However, for this to happen, online cinemas must support this standard. At the moment, only Amazon Video can offer this.
Screen resolutions
The screens and image enhancers are now a matter of small matters. Which resolution should you choose? Although, here it seems the answer is obvious. You should bet on 4K, especially if you are buying a TV to watch movies. But if you are choosing a small TV for the kitchen, then it is more logical not to chase new technologies, but to stick with the good old LCD TV with Full HD resolution.
UHD or 4K
Ultra-resolution 4K or UHD has already entered the sphere of televisions and monitors quite tightly, becoming mainstream. This marking indicates that the TV screen contains 4 times more pixels than Full HD screens. In practice, it looks like this: due to a smaller pixel size with the same diagonal, a 4K TV will show a clearer image with smooth contours and no gradients. If you choose between Full HD and UHD, the choice today is obvious. Ultra format is a priority and will be a good foundation for the future.
SUHD
But when you see the SUHD logo, don’t be fooled by this marketing ploy. We are not talking about any “super-4K” resolution. The definition of super high definition belongs to Samsung, which gave this name to its TVs with screens based on “quantum dots” or QLED, which we discussed above. In fact, we are talking about the same 4K ultra-resolution implemented on a QLED screen.
If you're willing to wait a little longer or want the best TV with the best resolution right now, choose 8K panels, which provide eight times the Full HD resolution. Today they can be counted on one hand, and they will become mainstream no earlier than in a couple of years. Let us also note that there is not much content in 8K resolution today either, so if you are not planning to go to Japan for permanent residence, you may not need such a super cool TV.
| Screen | |
|---|---|
| Screen type | IPS LCD panel with backlit direct LED backlight |
| Diagonal | 43 inches |
| Permission | 3840x2160 pixels (16:9) |
| Panel color depth | no data |
| Brightness | no data |
| Contrast | no data |
| Viewing Angles | wide viewing angle |
| Interfaces | |
| Antenna/Cable In | antenna input, analog and digital (DVB-T, DVB-T2, DVB-C) TV tuners (75 Ohm, coaxial - IEC75) |
| Satellite In | antenna input, satellite tuner (DVB-S/S2, 13/18 V, 0.7 A) (75 Ohm, coaxial - F-type) |
| PCMCIA card slot | connector for CI+ 1.4 access card (PCMCIA) |
| HDMI1/2/3/4 | digital inputs HDMI 2.0, video and audio, HDR, CEC, ARC (HDMI2 only), up to 3840×2160/60 Hz/4:4:4 (MonInfo report), 4 pcs. |
| Component in / AV in | component video input, composite video input, stereo audio input (5×RCA) |
| Optical Digital Audio Out | digital optical audio output S/PDIF (Toslink) |
| USB in 1/2 | USB 2.0 interface, connection of external devices, 0.5 A max. (type A socket) |
| LAN | wired Ethernet 100Base-TX (RJ-45) |
| Wireless interfaces | Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz; Bluetooth 4.2 Low Energy |
| Other characteristics | |
| Acoustic system | stereo speakers, 2.0, 20 W |
| Peculiarities |
|
| Dimensions (W×H×D) | 975×631×225 mm with stand 975×571×86 mm without stand |
| Weight | 10.3 kg with stand 9.1 kg without stand |
| Power consumption | 110 W, 0.5 W in standby mode |
| Supply voltage | 100—240 V, 50/60 Hz |
| Delivery set (must be checked before purchasing!) |
|
| Link to manufacturer's website | |
| Average current price | |
| Retail offers | |
Appearance
The design is simple and unpretentious. The TV is distinguished by a solid stamped metal frame framing the screen plane. The metal surface of the frame, apparently, is not bare, but has some kind of relatively resistant transparent coating, which we did not scratch as a test. The metal of the frame is magnetic, but can still be stainless. This frame is also the main drawback, since its beveled planes are likely to reflect in a lit room with almost any arrangement of lamps in the plane in front of the TV.
The TV looks neat from the back.
The casing at the back is made of thin sheet steel and has a matte black finish. The wide bottom end is made of black plastic with a matte surface. You can't call a TV thin by any stretch of the imagination.
The outer surface of the LCD matrix is almost mirror-smooth, but there is a slight matting, so the reflections in the screen are slightly blurred. The anti-glare properties of the screen are not as pronounced as in a number of models whose screens have a special coating.
At the bottom end in the center there is a cover made of transparent tinted plastic.
It contains a single mechanical button with which you can turn the TV on and off and control it very limitedly without using the remote control, an IR receiver for the remote control and a status indicator. In standby mode, the indicator lights up red (can be turned off in the settings menu), it is not very bright.
The standard stand consists of two parts - an arched base and a low stand combined with a mounting plate.
The base is stamped from thick steel and covered on top with a plastic casing with a silver coating. The second part of the stand is made of durable black plastic without coating. The base rests on five anti-slip pads made of elastic plastic. The rigidity of the structure is quite high, the TV stands stable with a slight tilt back.
An alternative way to install a TV without using a standard stand is to mount the TV on a wall using a bracket for VESA 200 by 200 mm mounting holes.
The connectors are located in three niches on the rear panel. Some of the connectors are directed back, some to the side.
Behind the grilles at the bottom end you can see two mid-high-frequency loudspeakers with elongated diffusers, and next to them are the bass reflex holes.
The TV and everything for it are packed in a fairly strong small box made of corrugated cardboard. For carrying, the box has slotted side handles. The box design is laconic.
Switching
Most of the connectors face backwards, making them difficult to access when wall-mounting the TV. The good thing is that the included power cable is equipped with a compact L-shaped connector on the side connecting to the TV and an L-shaped plug.
There will be less sticking out at the back.
The table with characteristics at the beginning of the article gives an idea of the communication capabilities of the TV.
All connectors are standard, full-size and freely placed. The pluses include as many as 4 HDMI inputs, while the minuses include the lack of a headphone jack. The user will have to use Bluetooth headphones. For testing, we successfully connected to our test wireless speaker Sven PS-200BL. At least basic support for HDMI control works: a player connected via HDMI turned off when the TV was turned off and vice versa, and the TV also turned on when the player was turned on (but the player did not turn on when the TV was turned on).
In Cast mode, you can transfer a copy of the mobile device screen and sound to your TV via Wi-Fi, but this mode is not suitable for watching video, as it additionally introduces compression artifacts and the frame rate is low. The TV itself can be used as an external audio system connected via Bluetooth, for example, to a smartphone or tablet, while the TV can have limited control over content playback.
Remote control and other control methods
The TV comes with a Magic series remote control (model AN-MR18BA), although the box says that it must be purchased separately. The remote control body is made mainly of black plastic, and partly of transparent, but densely tinted red plastic, transparent to IR. Thanks to its special shape, the remote control fits comfortably in your hand.
It can be laid down or placed on the butt. The remote control with batteries together weighs 149 g. The designations of most buttons are quite large and contrasting. There are not very many buttons, but not a few either, almost the optimal number. Some functions are selected by holding the buttons for a long time. When you press the buttons, the power button lights up red. There is scrolling through lists, etc. using a convenient wheel, and pressing the wheel corresponds to a selection command. There is a microphone hole at the front of the remote control. Pressing the button with the microphone icon mutes the TV's sound and puts it in the state of waiting for a voice command.
You can guess about some commands perceived by the TV; you can look up some of them in the built-in help.
For voice control to work, an Internet connection and user consent to the operation of the corresponding service are required. Voice control works well if you know what to say. The slightest deviation from the hard-wired commands - and the TV simply searches for videos on YouTube and the Internet, using what was said as keywords. Despite the help of the universal mind, there are no signs of any rudiments of intellectual comprehension of the teams.
The remote control works mainly via Bluetooth; only the on and off command is transmitted via IR. A side consequence of this is the need to pair the remote control and the TV. When you turn it on for the first time, pairing should happen automatically. If necessary, you can perform pairing or cancel it manually, as described in the manual. The undoubted advantages include the ability to configure this remote control to control other audio and video equipment. This is done according to the prompts displayed on the screen.
To control third-party equipment, the IR emitter of the remote control is used. It has to be controlled using the on-screen menu, which is not very convenient, and there are few functions, for example, there is no command to select an item in the disk menu.
The remote control has a coordinate input function - the cursor on the screen moves by tilting the remote control up and down and turning it left and right. The cursor appears on the screen after scrolling the wheel and disappears after several seconds of the remote control being inactive. When moving, the cursor does not extend beyond the edges of the screen, which makes it easy to calibrate coordinate input for a comfortable grip on the remote control. You can also connect a keyboard and mouse to the TV, but only via USB. Or rather, Bluetooth connection is supported only for some selected LG keyboards. These input devices, like any USB peripheral we have tested, work through a USB splitter, freeing up scarce USB ports for other tasks. There were no problems with wired and wireless keyboards and mice from different manufacturers. Scrolling with a wheel is supported, and the delay in moving the mouse cursor relative to the movement of the mouse itself is minimal. For the connected keyboard, you can select an alternative layout, including the most common Cyrillic layout, while it is supported to change the keyboard layout (using the Ctrl and space key combination) to the main one (English) and back to the selected one. Some keyboard keys from the main and additional multimedia set directly call a number of TV functions. Declared support for game controllers when connected via USB. It should be noted that in general the interface is well optimized for using only the remote control buttons, that is, using the remote control mouse or connecting a keyboard and mouse, in general, is not necessary.
In addition, the TV can be controlled via a mobile device using the proprietary LG TV Plus application for Android and iOS (the TV and mobile device must be on the same network).
In addition to control functions, this application allows you to access multimedia content located on your mobile device. Unfortunately, despite enabling the appropriate options in the TV settings, you cannot turn on the TV from standby mode from the application.
The software platform for this TV is the webOS Smart TV operating system based on the Linux kernel. On the main page of the interface there are icons for quick access to some functions, icons of running mini-applications, an editable ribbon of multi-colored beveled parallelograms with application icons, a similar in shape but larger access field to the previous application and a list of recent applications, access fields to favorites channels (My Channels) and to your favorite content (My Content).
The background for the page that is called up is usually an image of the current application. Of course, there is an application and content store.
The YouTube application, by the way, is not initially pre-installed; instead, LG decided to promote local streaming providers and Netflix, which is not very relevant for Russia.
There seem to be a lot of applications in the store, but, for example, among the games we couldn’t find anything more or less interesting. Although it would seem that the platform allows you to run something like flight or racing simulators... But the pages are rendered in a resolution of 1920x1080.
Of course, everything available for webOS Smart TV in terms of quantity and functionality cannot even be compared with the variety of applications for Android. It's a shame that many leading companies continue to obsessively push their smart TV platforms.
Let us note that in general we have no complaints about the stability of the shell. The TV responds to commands from the remote control with almost no delay, but, for example, a page with a list of settings may appear a few seconds after the call, especially if it has not yet been called in the current work session. All functionality is provided through applications and may take some noticeable time to launch.
The menu with TV settings occupies most of the screen, the inscriptions in it are readable. There is a Russified version of the interface. The quality of the translation is good, and the most important thing is that the settings in most cases change exactly what you expect based on their name.
Directly when adjusting image parameters, only the name of the setting, a slider and the current value or a list of options are displayed on the screen, which makes it easier to assess the impact of this setting on the image, while the settings with sliders are moved through the up and down arrows.
Sliders can be quickly moved by grabbing them with the mouse cursor. The lists in the menu are looped, which is convenient. Moving the cursor outside the menu field makes the menu translucent, and clicking there removes the settings menu from the screen. In general, this TV has many functions, as well as interface features, it is not possible to describe them all. In general, everything is implemented at a good level, user-friendly and aesthetically pleasing.
There is a lot of useful information in the built-in help:
It can be downloaded from the manufacturer's website as an archive file. True, you may not find information in it that relates specifically to this particular TV model, but, unfortunately, this has become a general trend. Manufacturers have enough time to develop and promote new TV models, but do not have enough resources to provide the user with all the information about them.
Playing multimedia content
In our superficial testing of multimedia content playback, we limited ourselves to a number of files launched mainly from external USB drives. Multimedia content sources can also be UPnP (DLNA) servers. We tested hard drives, external SSDs and regular flash drives. The two tested hard drives worked from either of the two USB ports, and in standby mode of the TV itself or after a certain period of inactivity, the hard drives turned off (this is configured in the settings menu). Note that the TV supports USB drives with FAT32 and NTFS file systems (exFAT is not supported), and there were no problems with Cyrillic file and folder names. The TV player detects all files in folders, even if there are a lot of files on the disk (more than 100 thousand), which is not the case with every smart TV. We have confirmed the TV's ability to display raster graphics files in JPEG, PNG and BMP formats, including as a slide show with background music.
True, the small icon of a running audio player cannot be removed (or rather, it can, but along with the music).
In the case of audio files, many common and not so common formats are supported, at least AAC, MP3, OGG, WMA (and 24-bit), M4A, WAV and FLAC (the extension must be FLAC). Tags are supported at least in MP3 (Russian must be in Unicode), cover pictures in MP3 and lyrics in the same MP3.
There is a search function, but it does not search by tags (how can that be?!), although they are displayed in a list sorted by tags. Therefore, the search results will still show the same content from streaming services, and not local content. Working with lists and the player itself look like two independent applications (and, most likely, they are). The TV screen can be turned off while audio files are playing.
For video files, a large number of different containers and codecs are supported (up to H.265 with 10 bits, HDR10 or HLG, with resolutions up to UHD at 60 fps), several audio tracks in various formats (AAC, AC3, DTS, MP3) , external and built-in text subtitles (Russian must be in Windows-1251 encoding or Unicode, at least three lines and 50 characters per line are displayed).
Setting subtitle output has many options.
Rarely, but there were video files with which the TV had problems. For example, DivX 3 in AVI did not play, and MPEG1 VCD and MPEG2 SVCD/KVCD did not scale correctly to fit the screen. In the standard video range (16-235) all shade gradations are displayed. Test videos to determine the uniformity of frame alternation helped to reveal that when playing video files, the TV adjusts the screen refresh rate to the frame rate in the video file, therefore, for example, frames of files with 24, 25, 30, 50 and 60 fps are displayed with the same duration. The maximum bitrate of video files, at which there were no artifacts yet, when playing from USB drives and via Wi-Fi (5 GHz) was at least 120 Mbit/s (there were no test files with a high bitrate), and over a wired Ethernet network - as minimum 90 Mbit/s (a file with a bitrate of 120 Mbit/s was already slowing down). In the last two cases, the router's media server was used. Statistics on the router show that the reception and transmission speed is 866.7 Mbps, that is, the TV actually has an 802.11ac adapter. By the way, in the YouTube application I was able to watch videos in 4K resolution with HDR and even 60 fps.
The built-in multimedia player can display dynamic (video files) and static (raster graphics files) images in a resolution of 3840x2160. All other programs, apparently, display the image at best in a resolution of 1920x1080, but, apparently, some of them (for example, YouTube) can output video in a true resolution of 3840x2160 using hardware decoding tools.
Sound
Working with video sources
Cinema operating modes were tested when connected to a Sony BDP-S300 Blu-ray player. An HDMI connection was used. The TV supports 480i/p, 576i/p, 720p, 1080i and 1080p signals at 24/50/60 Hz. The colors are correct, given the type of video signal, the brightness clarity is high, but the micro-contrast of the black-and-white world with vertical stripes across the pixel is slightly reduced. Color clarity is slightly lower than possible. In the standard video range (16-235) almost all shade gradations are displayed, only the lightest shade is indistinguishable in brightness from white. In the case of a 1080p signal at 24 fps, frames are output in a 2:3 sequence.
In the case of interlaced signals, only the unchanged parts of the frame are merged from the fields; changing areas are displayed in the fields. When scaling from low resolutions and even in the case of interlaced signals and dynamic images, the boundaries of objects are smoothed - the jagged edges on the diagonals are not very pronounced. The video noise reduction functions work very well, without leading to artifacts in the case of dynamic images. There is a function for inserting intermediate frames. Its quality is very good (but there are better ones), in most cases the intermediate frames are calculated correctly with a small number of subtle artifacts and with high detail.
When connected to a computer via HDMI, we received image output in a resolution of 3840 by 2160 pixels with a frame rate of up to 60 Hz inclusive. For a number of modes with a resolution of 1920 by 1080 pixels and below, there is an option to supply a signal with a frame rate of 100 and 120 Hz, but output to the screen occurs at a frequency of 50 and 60 Hz, respectively. Scaling to the resolution of the TV matrix (if necessary) is performed with good quality, the contrast of thin lines is preserved, but there are subtle artifacts in the form of white spaces between black lines on a gray background. However, this only matters when using the TV as a computer monitor. Also, despite the signal with high original color clarity (output in RGB or component signal mode with 4:4:4 color encoding, a video card with an AMD Radeon RX 550 GPU was used), the image itself is output to the TV screen with slightly reduced color clarity in horizontal direction. Thus, the vertical green lines are slightly blurred, and the vertical blue and red lines are darkened.
Under Windows 10, output in HDR mode to this TV is possible by selecting the appropriate options in the display settings. Or, for example, when playing in a video player in full screen mode using a video renderer, regardless of OS settings. Playing test HDR videos with 10-bit color and smooth gradients showed that their output in HDR mode was no different from output in 8-bit per color mode. However, test HDR videos with real images were subjectively output with good quality, this also applies to playback using the TV’s built-in player or from YouTube on the TV itself. At the same time, videos with just 10-bit color (not HDR) and smooth gradients in 10-bit mode were output with slightly fewer visible transitions between shades. It could be argued that in this case, HDR support is limited by the TV's ability to decode the relevant content and accept the HDR signal. Image output is essentially SDR in any case, as there is no support for true 10-bit output, nor wide-gamut or high-brightness output (shown below). The matrix of this TV clearly uses dynamic color mixing to output all shades, which manifests itself as a regular structure in some images, visible during rapid eye movement.
TV tuner
This model, in addition to the satellite tuner, is equipped with a tuner that receives analog and digital signals from broadcast and cable broadcasts. The quality of reception of digital channels on the indoor antenna in our room and in the case of this TV was at a high level. True, I had to precisely orient the antenna and open the window. We managed to find TV channels in all three multiplexes that broadcast in Moscow.
There is good support for the electronic program guide - you can see what exactly is on the current and other channels and program viewing.
Perhaps the only feature missing, which is common for advanced TVs, is the function of recording digital TV channels.
Microphotographs of the matrix
According to the specifications, this TV has an IPS matrix. Microphotographs do not contradict this (the black dots are dust on the camera sensor):
Note that there is no “crystalline effect” (microscopic variation in brightness and hue) in this case.
Brightness and power consumption measurements
This TV is equipped with direct LED backlighting, but there is no zone-based backlight control; the brightness is changed over the entire area at once. To avoid the influence of non-switchable dynamic adjustment of the backlight brightness (in dark images the backlight brightness is reduced, and in a black field on the entire screen it is turned off completely), brightness measurements were carried out at 16 points of the screen on a checkerboard field with alternating black and white fields. Contrast was calculated as the ratio of the brightness of the white and black fields at the measured points.
Hardware measurements showed that the contrast is typical for a modern IPS-type matrix, the uniformity of the white and black fields is average, but the contrast uniformity is good, which means that the brightness of the black and white fields varies approximately symbatically over the area. Visually, the white field shows that the brightness decreases towards the edges and especially towards the corners of the display area. This can be partly explained by the design of the screen: between the LCD matrix itself and the backlight plane there is a gap of several millimeters, so when viewed close up at a large angle to the screen, you can see that the image seems to float in the air.
But because of this, the edges of the LCD matrix are illuminated less. On the black field you can see some variation in illumination over the screen area:
The image above is made up of halves of two photographs. The discarded halves contain the mouse cursor of the TV interface, which prevents the backlight from turning off.
When the mode with dynamic brightness control is turned on, the established contrast formally increases to infinity, since on a black field on the entire screen the backlight is turned off completely. The graph below shows how brightness increases (vertical axis) when switching from a black field (after five seconds of output) to white for a black field size of 1% of the screen area (no dynamic brightness adjustment) and 100% (dependencies not smoothed):
It can be seen that the brightness of the backlight does not rise very quickly to the maximum value after displaying the black field on the entire screen and after a short delay.
Brightness of the white field in the entire screen when measured in the center of the screen and power consumption (no connected USB devices, sound off, Wi-Fi active):
In standby mode, the consumption of an unconfigured TV is 0.2 W, and after connecting to Wi-Fi, consumption increases to 0.4 W.
At maximum brightness, the image will not appear faded even in a brightly lit room with artificial light. Whereas in complete darkness you can set a comfortable brightness level.
The backlight brightness is controlled using PWM with a frequency of 120 Hz:
Dependence of brightness (vertical axis) on time (horizontal axis) for different backlight brightness settings
The modulation frequency is relatively low, so at medium and low brightness during rapid eye movement or in the stroboscopic effect test, image flickering may be detected.
The heating of the TV can be assessed from the following images from an IR camera, obtained after long-term operation at maximum brightness in a room with a temperature of approximately 24 °C:
Front heating
It can be seen that the main source of heat is three areas of the screen.
Rear heating
The photo from the back shows the possible location of the heating modules of the power supply (on the left in the photo) and “smart” electronics (on the right in the photo).
Determining response time and output latency
The response time for the black-white-black transition is 15 ms (7 ms on + 8 ms off). Transitions between semitones occur on average in 21 ms in total. There is no pronounced “overclocking” of the matrix. From our point of view, this matrix speed is quite enough even for dynamic games.
We determined the total output delay from switching video buffer pages to the start of displaying the image on the screen:
Enabling the game mode reduces the delay to the point where the delay is no longer felt when using the TV as a monitor for working on a PC, and in dynamic games it is unlikely to lead to a decrease in results.
Color rendering quality assessment
To assess the nature of brightness growth, we measured the brightness of 256 shades of gray (from 0, 0, 0 to 255, 255, 255) when connected to a PC in RGB mode. The Gamma parameter is set to Medium, the Contrast setting is reduced to 90. The graph below shows the increase (not absolute value!) in brightness between adjacent halftones:
On average, the increase in brightness is uniform, and each subsequent shade is brighter than the previous one. In the darkest area, all gradations of shades are distinguished:
The approximation of the resulting gamma curve gave a value of 2.23, which is slightly higher than the standard value of 2.2, while the real gamma curve deviates little from the approximating power function:
To assess the quality of color rendering, we used the i1Pro 2 and spectrophotometer.
The color gamut changes depending on the selected color gamut profile. In the case of the "Auto" profile and when connected to a PC, or in any case when selecting the "Extended" profile, the coverage is very close to the boundaries of the sRGB color space:
At the same time, the colors on the screen have a natural saturation, since almost all images currently require viewing on devices with sRGB coverage. It is possible to select the “Wide” profile, then the coverage increases slightly, but visually the image remains almost unchanged:
Below is the spectrum for the white field (white line), superimposed on the spectra of the red, green and blue fields (lines of the corresponding colors) for the “Wide” profile:
This spectrum with a relatively narrow peak of blue and wide humps of green and red is typical for monitors that use white LED backlighting with a blue emitter and a yellow phosphor. In this case, the green hump is relatively well separated from the red hump, which led to a slight increase in color gamut.
By default, the color temperature is too high, but the “Color. temperature" it can be reduced to the standard 6500 K. The graphs below show the color temperature in different parts of the gray scale and the deviation from the spectrum of an absolutely black body (parameter ΔE), obtained with "Color. temp" = W46:
The range closest to black can be ignored, since color rendering in it is not so important, and the error in measuring color characteristics is high. From a consumer point of view, the balance is very good, since over most of the gray scale the color temperature is close to the standard 6500 K and ΔE is below 10 units, while both parameters change little from shade to shade.
We note a relatively smooth decrease in brightness when deviating from the perpendicular to the screen in all three directions, while the halftone brightness graphs do not intersect over the entire range of measured angles. When deviating in the diagonal direction, the behavior of the brightness of the shades is intermediate between the vertical and horizontal directions, with the exception of the brightness of the black field, which begins to increase sharply already at 20°-30° deviation from the perpendicular to the screen. The contrast in the angle range ±82° for two directions significantly exceeds 10:1, and only for the diagonal direction is it lower and along one diagonal falls below 10:1 at 68°.
To quantify the change in color rendering, we performed colorimetric measurements for white, gray (127, 127, 127), red, green and blue, as well as light red, light green and light blue fields in the full screen using a setup similar to that , which was used in the previous test. Measurements were carried out in the angle range from 0° (the sensor is directed perpendicular to the screen) to 80° in steps of 5°. The obtained intensity values were recalculated into deviation ΔE relative to the measurement of each field at a perpendicular position of the sensor relative to the screen. The results are presented below:
You can choose a deviation of 45° as a reference point. The criterion for maintaining the correctness of colors can be considered a value of ΔE less than 3. Color stability is good, but in the case of IPS-type matrices it can be even better.
conclusions
The LG 43UK6710 TV does not have outstanding characteristics or any special design, but it has 4K resolution and supports HDR. The second in this case means that the TV can play HDR video files and receive an HDR video signal, while the image output will be at the SDR quality level, since there is no real 10-bit output, the color gamut practically does not exceed sRGB, and the peak brightness is low . In addition, formally, for such a diagonal to have practical benefits from 4K resolution, the TV must be viewed from a distance of no more than 1.7 m. And yet, the set of multimedia functions and interface equipment of this TV is almost no worse than that of top models. LG 43UK6710 will find its buyer - one who needs a modern, small-sized TV from a well-known manufacturer. It can be recommended for watching TV shows and movies, as well as for playing games, but using it as a computer monitor for working with texts, images, etc. is not recommended for a number of reasons. Below are the lists:
Advantages
- Very convenient remote control with mouse function
- Excellent multimedia capabilities
- Good color quality
- No variation in frame duration in case of 24 fps files
- Well-functioning tween insertion feature
- Quite fast response time and low output lag (in game mode)
- Good quality of reception of digital terrestrial TV programs
- Voice control support
- Control via mobile app
- The remote control can be configured to control other equipment
- Convenient menu
Flaws
- No headphone output
- Screen flickering may be visible at low brightness
- Variation of frame duration in the case of a signal with 24 fps
- There may be reflections from the screen frame
TVs with support for High dynamic range (HDR) are no longer uncommon, as is corresponding HDR content. This technology has become a recent trend. Should you pay attention to it when choosing a TV?
What's happenedHDR
The most important parameters for the quality of the displayed image are contrast and color accuracy. If you put two TVs next to each other, one 4K and the other Full HD, but with an increased contrast range and better color reproduction, then most will choose the latter option. Because the image on it looks more realistic and less flat. The abbreviation HDR stands for “High Dynamic Range”, i.e. extended dynamic range. "Extended" in this case means higher peak brightness and more darkness where there shouldn't be any light. The performance is compared with the traditional SDR range.
What is the difference with HDR in photography?
The term HDR is like a marketing joke and creates confusion. The HDR found in TVs has nothing to do with the technology with a similar name in smartphones or cameras. If we talk about photography, then HDR is the combination of several images with different exposures, where the goal is to achieve the most even option in terms of shadows and light. This is not the case with video – here we are talking about the total amount of information. Before the advent of HDR, the standard picture, including on Blu-ray, was 8 bit. This is a good color gamut, but modern panels, especially OLED, are capable of displaying much more shades, gradients and colors than 8-bit sources can.
Along with HDR came a new standard for the color palette, Rec. 2020, which contains such shades that they simply could not be reproduced on an ordinary TV. Ferrari's signature red color is one such example. You may not have noticed it, but such intense colors used to look different than they did in real life.
What does this give in practice?
Full HDR requires two things: a suitable TV and an image source. To provide high dynamic range, HDR TVs use advanced backlighting, the brightness of which can be adjusted in specific areas of the screen.
The sun begins to shine noticeably brighter in scenes, and there is an understanding that in one frame there can be several lighting sources of different brightness and saturation. The problem with pixelation of halftones in dark scenes disappears, and gradients and complex color mixtures gain volume. The sky is no longer overexposed and blends into the ground at the horizon line. In short, you see the picture more with your own eye than with the limited eyepiece of the camera.
What are the typesHDRon TVs
The “HDR Ready” label is attached to all new TVs – regardless of whether they are capable of adequately displaying 10-bit or not. There's a big difference between a true HDR TV and a panel that simply displays HDR content, downsampling it to 8-bit and simply bumping up the colors and contrast. A significant part of LCD TVs use active 8-bit panels that “add up” colors using special algorithms. The HDR picture on such panels is slightly worse than OLED, but they are also noticeably cheaper.
There are two main standards: HDR10 and Dolby Vision. In short, the HDR10 standard transmits fewer colors and supports only 10 bits, but is completely open. The Dolby standard preserves color better and extends up to 12 bits, but is more difficult to comply with and implement.
There is plenty of content for HDR10, as it is the base format for UHD Blu-Ray and streaming services that have implemented HDR broadcasts (including Netflix, Amazon Video and Vudu). The Sony PlayStation 4 Slim/Pro and Microsoft Xbox One S/X game consoles also work with HDR10.
In turn, Dolby Vision does not have such basic support (but Netflix contains both a library for HDR10 and content in Dolby Vision). Among those who do not work with this format are Samsung and Panasonic, as well as 20th Century Fox. At the same time, Dolby Vision has strengthened as a premium HDR format. No premium 4K TV should be without it.
How to connect supported equipmentHDR
But don’t rush to change all the wires along with the TV! Old cables are compatible with HDMI 2.0a, no matter what the marketers tell you. The main thing is that they are marked “High Speed with Ethernet”. We only care about throughput - the connectors themselves have not changed. If you connect equipment through an AV receiver, make sure it has HDMI 2.0a ports. Fortunately, many manufacturers have been able to software update HDMI 2.0 interfaces to 2.0a, so check for the latest firmware.
Does this technology live up to the hype? In short, yes! Experts agree that this is the first significant leap forward since the transition from standard definition (SD) to high-definition television (HDTV).
